The Europa League might be European football’s secondary competition, but Porto had only lost once at home in almost two years and the team that beat them was Barcelona. They were more than capable of giving a rotated Arsenal team a tough ride if we weren’t up to the task in hand. While winning wasn’t ultra important in the group the chance to keep our winning streak going was one we didn’t want to give up on.
Unai Emery made six changes to the starting 11 that came from behind to win 3-1 at home to Everton on Monday night. Sokratis Papastathopoulos, Mohamed Elneny, Aaron Ramsey, Matteo Guendouzi, Danny Welbeck and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang came into the team with Hector Bellerin, Shkodran Mustafi, Lucas Torreira, Mesut Ozil, Alex Iwobi and Alexandre Lacazette making way. Granit Xhaka continued in the left back role that he played in for the last 20 minutes on Monday night while Stephan Lichsteiner switched to right back as Rob Holding kept his place yet again. Xhaka switching to left back meant we saw a combination of Guendouzi and Elneny in midfield and it’s still a combination which fails to convince me.
Guendouzi is making so much progress since joining us in the summer that it’s a joy to watch him, but it’s hard to see where Elneny is going at the club. He’s not the most spectacular player and he looks a fair way short of the level of Guendouzi never mind Torreira. It can’t be easy for him and our squad needs the depth he offers, but I can’t see us controlling a game with him in the team.
The first half wasn’t much to write home about with very little happening at either end, but Arsenal picked up the pace after the break. They dominated that second half and that domination only increased when Torreira came on for Elneny around the hour mark. His ability to control a game and drive the team forward is a joy to watch and he looks more and more like the player we have needed for years with each passing game.
In that second half Aubameyang had a couple of one on ones with the keeper after we found good passes in behind them, but he couldn’t make either chance pay. The first was wide on the right of the goal and he probably should have gone for the far post, but went on the near side. He got in on the left the next time and had to go with his left foot which meant he couldn’t do an “Henry” into the far corner and the keeper made a good save from an attempted clip over him. Maybe he wasn’t as spectacular as he was when he came off the bench on Monday night, but then again he didn’t have Ozil to pull the strings.
When the goal came it was Welbeck who got it after he took advantage of a slip from the Sporting central defender to finish crisply through the keeper’s legs. He had an earlier effort disallowed after he was rather harshly adjudged to have push a defender before an excellent header back across the keeper in the top corner. He has only had a bit part to play with Aubameyang and Lacazette ahead of him, but he has done very well and has five goals already from his limited chances.
All in all it wasn’t exactly a game to write home about, but it was a job well done in a stadium where away teams simply don’t win. It’s kept our incredible winning streak going and can only help to strengthen the belief and confidence in the team as well as letting the first choice players know they need to keep looking over their shoulders with others looking to take their places in the team. As I said in my preview the game away to Palace on Sunday is far more important, but it’s nice to be going into that game on the back of 11 consecutive wins and a clean sheet too.
That’s it for today.
See you tomorrow.
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